John McCasey (1819-1895) - Civil War Vet and Mining Engineer

PCA Archives

John McCasey was born between 1819 and 1825 in Ireland.  At some point, he immigrated to the United States and settled in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.  He seems to have had a rather good education, enabling him to work as a machinist, mining engineer and metallurgist throughout his life.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, McCasey enlisted as a private in Company E, 8th Pennsylvania Infantry, on April 18, 1861.  He and Cornelia Connolly were married before a priest on June 4, 1861, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. 

McCasey was soon promoted to the rank of captain in Company K, 110th Pennsylvania Infantry.  However, he resigned his commission on July 29, 1861, stating that ill health made him unfit to perform his duties.  He returned home to recuperate, where his and Cornelia’s first child, William Francis, was born on August 12 of the following year.

McCasey reenlisted briefly on July 1, 1863, in Company B, 41st Pennsylvania Emergency Militia, an ad hoc unit raised to defend the state from the Confederate advance toward Gettysburg.  He was discharged on August 3, 1863.

Following the Civil War, McCasey found work as a machinist.  He and Cornelia, or Lillie as she was called, had eight children, although only four lived to adulthood.

The 1880 federal census of Jersey City, New Jersey, lists McCasey as a ‘silver miner’.  Shortly after his oldest son turned 21, McCasey moved to Arizona, while his wife Cornelia remained in Pennsylvania to raise the rest of their children.

McCasey found work as a mining engineer in the vicinity of the Harqua Hala Mine near Yuma.  In 1889, he wrote a detailed description of the ores and other minerals to be found there.  In 1891, he discovered a significant onyx deposit north of Cave Creek, Arizona.

John McCasey moved to Mesa, Arizona, and set up an assay office there in 1893.  After transferring his GAR membership to the John Wren Owen GAR Post, he filed for and received Invalid Pension #865,681. He seems to have lost touch with his friends back East, as his whereabouts were not known until one of his old Army companions tracked him down through the GAR.

McCasey died February 23, 1895, having been hospitalized for about three months with pulmonary tuberculosis.  He was buried in Porter Cemetery.

His widow Cornelia filed for and received a Civil War Widow’s pension, # 471,053.  She was living in the Bronx, New York City, when she died on June 29, 1919.

-Donna Carr